Vol. III Chapter 72 Riding Shotgun (Part 2 of 2)

From the top of the hill John could see the havoc unfolding below. A dozen mutants sprang from the forest, supported by wild and indiscriminate gunfire. People scattered, fleeing for their lives and finding cover in the ruins.

John sprinted towards the fray. "Air and armour's rolling, twelve minutes." Sara kept pace at his side. He didn't think there'd be anyone left to save in twelve minutes.

John caught sight of muzzle flashes in the trees, and fired the grenade launcher Rosie fitted. Three plunks sounded, followed by explosions seconds later. He didn't look, focused on the nearest mutant. It turned from the terrified civilians, drawn by a real fight.

Bullets pinged off his armour like hail. John put everything he had into keeping the armour moving, bringing the momentum of running downhill with him.

He drove his shoulder into the nearest mutant. Its jaw shattered and caved in. It writhed and spluttered on the floor till John finished it with a stomp. To his right Sara unleashed precise and deadly strikes with her twin blades.

"Hey!" John yelled through the armour's speakers. Ten mutants remained, all of them bearing down on a pair of knights.

"Loser pays the bar tab." Sara strode forward. She sidestepped an attack, countering with a double slash that killed the mutant outright. John drew his warhammer. His first swing cracked and split a mutant's skull like dry firewood. They fought side by side. For every mutant Sara maimed and gutted, John broke and crushed the life from another.

"Well?" Sara asked, deftly flicking the blood from her blades.

"Six." John answered, switching to his light machine gun.

"I got six, privilege of rank means the win is mine." Sara teased.

"Not done yet Boss." John could hear them coming.

John turned to face the forest, Sara at his side. The two of them stood as the only thing between hundreds of civilians and dozens of rampaging mutants. "How long on that backup?" John asked, trying to hide his worry.

"Not long." Sara answered. John knew she meant too long.

The pair of them fired from the hip. A full box mag each did little to improve their odds. John slung his gun, gripped his warhammer tight and planted his feet. Dozens of mutants swarmed through the trees and into the open. They charged, frenzied by the blood in the air.

He felt himself pacing backwards. John knew keeping himself and Sara alive would be all he could do.

Explosions erupted feet from him. Shock waves toppling mutants, shrapnel rending green flesh. High calibre rounds strafed the advancing horde, cutting them down. "Reloading!" Sara yelled. John covered her then did the same.

Forty millimetre grenade rounds burst at head height. Fifty cal heavy fire rained in. John and Sara picked off the shell shocked and wounded brutes till nothing in front of them moved.

John looked back up the hill, seeing an unmistakable silhouette in the afternoon soon. Robco's truck, him sat atop it. The canvas torn away to reveal Rusty. The affectionate moniker for the half Sentry bot mounted on the flatbed.

He saw steam venting from the bot and Grimm moving to reload the bot's arms. The truck started to turn. "Something's wrong." John started moving, heading up the hill.

Bullets zipped overhead, Rusty started firing. "They're coming John!" Robco shouted over the radio. "Grimm's hit, it's real bad!"

"Hold on!" John panted, the strain of moving the armour uphill taking all his breath.

"John." Robco sounded calmer, his breathing laboured. "I need you to promise you'll watch out for Lou and the boy."

"Hold on, please, hold on." John begged.

"Promise me, son." His friend asked him.

"I promise, on my oath." John's voice broke.

"Thank you." He sighed with relief and drew in a deep breath. "Give 'em hell Rusty!" Robco yelled, firing with one hand, starting the truck with the other.

John heard the truck start up and saw it roll down the other side. He wrenched his burning limbs to move. He made it to the top of the hill as the truck powered down to the bottom. Mutants swarmed the truck, still getting ripped apart by gunfire.

The Sentry bot self destructed, vaporising the mutants in a mushroom cloud of atomic fire. John fell to his knees, the breath taken from his body.

Vertibirds flew overhead. Switching into a hover as the door gunners cleared the remaining mutants. Charlie appeared, Matt and Rosie at her side. All in their R frames and all bloody. Rosie saw John, saw the truck, and wept.

Something glinting caught John's eye. He went to pick it up as others spoke around him.

"We took out four squads of raiders. No sign of Jones." Charlie reported to Sara. "What was this?" She asked.

"Too big for a probe. Too small to be the main force." Sara clung to her rational thought process. "My gut tells me this was all he could muster on short notice, but let's not test that theory."

"Tempest, Valkyrie. We're taking small arms fire from the south east. Request permission to engage?" She asked, hovering steady in the air.

"Negative. I want you trimming the trees, round up the cargo and get them moving. No one gets left behind. How copy?" Sara gave her orders and looked to Charlie. "I want two Recon teams to assist. The rest of you start sweeping." She took a deep breath. "John?" Sara softened her voice and turned, seeing only his armour. "Where the fuck's John?!"

Freed from his armour, John sprinted through the trees. Pistol in one hand, Grimm's spear in the other. The last act of his friend and mentor leaving it aside. John would put it to use.

He caught sight of the fleeing raiders. Four of them, one had an old hunting rifle with a scope. John stayed in the dreamlike state, the pain quelled by his rage.

John ripped a shotgun from the raider's grasp, slamming him into a low branch hard enough to break it off. He took down the next two with strikes from the shaft of the spear. The sniper got a shot off at close range. John span from the bullet's path. He grabbed the rifle, whipping it round and cracking the raider's nose with the stock.

Time snapped back as John worked the bolt on the rifle. Four raiders downed but alive. "My friend taught me about you. He said every time you kill a raider, you save two lives. Yours, and the next person they were going to kill." John took a deep breath. All it did was fuel his searing rage.

"First one to talk gets to live. Where's Jones?!" John waited half a second before drawing his pistol and firing. He killed a raider. It only made him angrier. "Where's Jones?!" John fired again instantly, leaving two.

"We don't know!" One blurted out, panicking. "He led the freaks up here. Told us to cover them till they cou—" John pushed Grimm's spear into the raider's throat, slowly, withdrawing the tip so the raider drowned in his own blood.

"This the gun you used to kill my friend?" John pressed the barrel of the rifle into the raider's knee cap and squeezed the trigger. The raider's knee shattered, blood pouring from his leg.

"Yeah, I shot the old man!" He sneered through an agonised face. John shifted the rifle to his head. He pulled the trigger and the rifle clicked. The raider laughed. John hit him with the rifle stock. He kept hitting him till the rifle came apart in his bloodied hands.

John walked back to his armour. So enraged he could barely see straight. He found Sara waiting. "Jones is out here. I'm going after him." He got back into his armour, flexing the mechanised hands.

"I need you here." Sara didn't order him.

"You don't un—" John saw he wasn't the only one in pain.

"I don't what? Understand?!" Sara let her emotion flare.

"He saved me. I got him killed." John felt his blinding anger recede, deep and raw pain in its place.

"He saved you, me, and everyone out here. I'm going to get every single fucking one of them to safety. Because that is what your friend gave his life for. Are you going to help me do that?" Sara regained her composure in a way John wanted desperately to copy. She helped him see how to honour the sacrifice of the man that saved him on the road, once again.

People moved quick and quiet. Birds flew overhead, taking the wounded to the Vault. John kept it together for the remainder of the mercifully uneventful day.

All of the ruined houses around the Vault that were still habitable were occupied. Even some that were little more than shells gave shelter to the tired and traumatised. John made his way through, heading up to the Vault.

"I should be the one to…" John said to Sara, sparring her a trip underground. He'd thought of little else for hours and still didn't know what to say.

"He saved my life, I want to pay my respects." Sara didn't lie, not exactly. John felt grateful for her company.

From the outside, everything looked as it had done for a century. Inside the cave mouth and Vault entrance, the walls were lined with people. Each waiting for the lift down. No one questioned two bloodied and exhausted knights as they walked past.

A stranger held out a water bottle. John took it gladly, gulping down half then splashing his face. Someone else held out more. Another person offered sandwiches, then whiskey. Anything they could spare in gratitude.

Jen met them by the lift, forcing a smile. "I'm not waiting." John went into the security booth and levered up the floor panel.

He climbed down the ladder with ease, Sara with him. Then back through the hidden staircase and out onto the abandoned level one. All without a word.

A wall of noise hit them as the lift doors opened into the atrium. A giant steel box filled with people who'd never seen anything like it. John made his way through them, clueless as to where to start.

He caught a glimpse of Mike, helping to bring order to the rabble by checking off names on a clipboard. Mike saw him and knew. He led them up to the top level, stopping to see Anne first.

"I'll handle this." Sara stepped in through the open door frame. John saw how much she hated it, but she held command and the duty fell to her. Anne looked up from her boxes of books. Sara took her hand and sat her down.

"I'm sorry Anne. Grimm, Mick, didn't make it. He and Robco gave their lives to save hundreds of others, myself and John among them." Sara didn't give her more information than needed.

"I understand. Thank you for telling me." Anne went back to her box of books. She stayed standing for all of three seconds before her knees went. Sara eased her into the chair.

"I'll see to her." Mike took over, knowing they had another stop to make.

"Wait." Anne called after them. She rummaged through a box, producing a dog eared and annotated copy of the Art of War. It brought a sad smile to Sara's face. "There's one for you both." They took the folded letters from the book. "Here. He'd want you to have it." Anne offered John the book and he took it.

"Still teaching me things." John folded the book along the well worn crease, slipping it into the pocket on his under armour.

John walked along the upper level to the residence Louisa and Wallace had picked out. The sound of Wallace laughing stopped him in his tracks. "They're only going to remember one thing from today, and it won't be what you tell them. Be direct, but let them take it at their own pace." Sara gave him good advice, then hung back.

He stepped in, his manner carrying the bad news. Louisa pulled her son close. "I'm so sorry. Robco didn't make it." John kept his voice from breaking, just. Louisa slumped against a wall.

"It's not fair." Wallace got angry, tears running down his face. "My Dad died so Pop Pop shouldn't die." He shoved John, overwhelmed with emotion. "It's not fair!" He balled his hands into fists pounding them against John. He let him, before kneeling and hugging the boy tightly as they both sobbed.

Sara took Wallace's hand, sitting with him on the couch. "A long time ago, I did something stupid and got very lucky. They gave me this." From the inside pocket of her under armour, Sara produced a medal. A shining silver cog attached to a strip of blue cloth.

"I never felt like I'd earned it, so I carried it around. Thought maybe one day I might do something brave enough to deserve it. Your grandfather saved my life today. And John's life. And the lives of hundreds of others." Sara pressed the medal into his small hand. "When you miss him, I want you to look at that medal. Then look at the people around you." Sara pulled the boy in close. Her gift to him a gift to them all.

The cool night air came as a welcome relief as he went back outside. People still lining the walls and filling the houses. He found Rosie sitting in a waiting Vertibird, Matt and Charlie with her. She walked over, putting her arms round him.

"Is Wallace…" Her voice broke.

"He's strong." John didn't think it right a boy so young should know so much loss. "Here. He'd want you to have this." He gave her Grimm's spear. He didn't want to think about what he'd done with it. Rosie flicked her wrist, the bulky handle flicking out and locking in place. "He taught you well."

"I'll put it to good use." She collapsed it back down just as quickly. "We've got an op."